


Holding On To You

by ridakulous



Category: Faking It (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Character Death, Comfort, F/F, Fucking, Violence, ZOMBIES!!, also a dog, but not major, everything else with zombies, otp: boob handling 101
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-25
Updated: 2014-06-25
Packaged: 2018-02-06 05:48:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1846660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ridakulous/pseuds/ridakulous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set about one year after S1 Finale. Canon-compliant. Zombie fic, so all of the general zombie guidelines apply.</p><p> </p><p> Amy grabs the first thing she can reach that isn’t a decorative napkin, and Lauren looks over at her, incredulous.</p><p>"Seriously! Are you going to caffeinate him to death? I thought joining the lumberjack squad would give you survival instincts, or something."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holding On To You

There's something wrong with Bruce. Amy's eyes furrow as she looks over him, trying to understand how he got out of the house under her mother's watchful eye. Farrah cares more about appearance than anyone Amy's ever met and Bruce's untucked, grass-stained button up is a disaster. She must have been in a rush to get to the studio this morning. It isn't until she realizes, really realizes, that part of his skull is caved in that Amy screeches, something Lauren would be proud of.

It must be a mating call or something, because Lauren's beside her in a second, an insult already on the tip of her tongue when she sees how pale Amy is. She wastes no time.

"What, did Ellen DeGeneres die or something? Did your coven kick you out for lack of experience?"

Bruce finally acknowledges them, and he's, well, drooling. A lot. His head tilts, as if he's sizing them up, and Lauren finally looks over at her father. Amy goes deaf for half a minute.

"What do we do?" Lauren sounds as hysterical as Amy feels, and all of the heavy things - frying pans, rolling pin, butchers knife - are behind the decaying guy in front of them. Amy grabs the first thing she can reach that isn't a decorative napkin, and Lauren looks over at her incredulous.

"Seriously! Are you going to caffeinate him to death? I thought joining the lumberjack squad would give you survival instincts, or something." Bruce lurches over, closing the distance between them. Lauren grips onto Amy's arm like she's a lifeboat, her voice growing more and more shrill as he clambers over to them. Amy's knuckles turn white, a stark contrast to the plastic, black coffee pot handle. This can't be real life. Zombies are not real life, getting your heart broken by your best friend is. High school is. Not this.

"Amy do something!"

He smells, and it's not the normal, gross teenage boy smell she's used to, but musky blood and dinner that got left next to the sink for a week to rot. The groan that comes out of his mouth sounds more like a growl, angry and feral and hungry, and Amy feels lightheaded at the responsibility thrown onto her shoulders. Bruce seems fixated on his daughter's shrieking voice, and his feet drag towards them. It feels nothing like the slow-motion movies she watches. Used to watch?

"Don't just stand there! What are you doing! This is not a time for one of your gay panics just get him."

"Stop backseat fighting!" Bruce turns his attention to her, and Amy reacts. The glass shatters on impact, and Bruce doesn't go down. Amy and Lauren scramble backwards, and Amy grabs for the wooden chair she eats breakfast on. Lauren's finally quiet, for once in her life, and Amy suddenly wishes she had actually worked out in gym class when she tries to raise the heavy chair above her head. She settles with swinging it like a baseball bat, and it connects with Bruce's midsection, throwing him backwards into the counter. The sharp edge catches the soft spot of his head, and he doesn't get back up.

"Daddy?" Lauren's voice cuts through the silence, incredibly small. Amy's heart twists as she catches the raw look on Lauren's face, and she wraps her arm around her, not letting Lauren near the twice-dead zombie.

"Don't look." Her awkward arm-wrap becomes a genuine hug, and it's easy to forget how tiny Lauren actually is when she never shuts off. Amy can feel tears soaking into her t-shirt, and she gives Lauren a minute to grieve. For now, the house is safe.

~~

Numb. If she thought she was numb when Karma broke her heart, she was wrong. Because right now, it's like she's watching herself move, like she isn't in control of her body. Lauren clutches onto her like she's the last non-drooling person alive, but Amy can barely feel it. She hasn't spoken, since Bruce, and Amy should probably be worried.

Karma's house is close, the television studio isn't. It's the next logical choice, but logic doesn't really matter when she's desperate to give someone else the ropes to hold onto. She's a teenage girl; she isn't built to last through a zombie apocalypse, let alone lead someone else through one. She can't even find a girlfriend, and she still falls asleep in history class.

Lauren doesn't want to move but Amy can't leave her there, unable to defend herself, so she tags along. Her vision feels too sharp and the sweat is cool on her back as Fall sinks in. It's supposed to be her senior year. She's supposed to escape, soon, to New York or San Francisco or somewhere where she can have more than Shane. And Shane's great, he really is, but he isn't a lesbian and Amy's pretty sure she's more than scared away the local clique with her subpar, borderline-creepy flirting.

She goes to Karma because she's gone to Karma her entire life. It doesn't matter that the past year has been awkward, uncomfortable and full of more hate than she ever thought possible. The pain, the heartbreak, it feels too far away when Karma could be- It's too much right now and she has to stay strong. If she doesn't, she's toast, and if she's toast then Lauren is... burnt croquembouche. Amy turns the corner to Karma's block, steeling herself for what she might find. Of all the things in the world, she doesn't expect dancing zombies.

"Amy, dear, join us!"

Dancing, talking zombies. The voice is familiar, too familiar, and under all of the blood and dirt she can see Karma's parents in the middle of a horde of zombies. Amy blinks a couple of times, and Lauren makes this tiny, gasping noise, and all of the sudden a dozen pairs of eyes are looking at them, hungry. 

"Lauren, run!" Amy whispers, pointing at Karma's house. In all of the years that Amy's known Karma, her front door has never been locked. Lauren's frozen in place and Amy drags her, literally, the first couple of steps before she snaps out of it. Amy's too busy to let out a relieved sigh, because she just doesn't have the guns to carry her into the house without becoming zombie food.

Karma's house is probably one of the worst places to be in a zombie apocalypse. All of the food is extremely perishable, and kale tastes disgusting if you don't smother it in some kind of sauce. For now, any house will do, and Amy can't really do anything until the Ashcrofts decide to come back inside. Her mother is too far away, her step-father is dead in their kitchen, Karma's obviously not home and Lauren is, well, here.

Amy turns to look at her, so out of place in the Ashcroft house. Amy loves them, she really does, but they're such hippies and Lauren is nothing if not high maintenance. Sitting in a lopsided stool at a crooked table, Lauren looks completely lost.

"Hey... are you okay?"

"Just fucking perfect, idiot." Lauren's head snaps around so fast Amy gets whiplash just looking at her, and it's unsurprising that her tone is beyond scathing. Amy finds comfort in Lauren's attitude, because it's so familiar and normal, which is kind of messed up. She sits down on a creaky chair, right next to her, meeting the angry look in Lauren's eyes evenly.

"Look, there's no need to be such a bitch. We're in this together."

Lauren's eyes narrow, and Amy braces herself for a lot of screaming, directed solely at her. Instead, Lauren keeps quiet with her intense glare, and Amy sighs putting her forehead in her hands. Lauren scoffs, and it's Amy's turn to level an angry glare across the table.

"Look, you're not the only person who's lost someone, okay? My mom's in the middle of downtown right now, all of my friends refuse to pick up their phones, and I'm stuck here with you and nothing to drink myself stupid with."

It's nearly impossible to keep it together, to just breathe, when their entire everything is crashing around them and Lauren has the decency to look guilty. They sit in silence, which is more comfortable than uncomfortable, and Amy distracts herself. She doesn't have the time or attention span to notice anything, let alone Lauren's subtle guilt, and she takes out her phone for what feels like the hundredth time that day. Her battery is circling the drain - iPhones just aren't built to last without a charger any more - and she tries her mother, once, twice.

And then she tries Karma. Her stomach ties in knots at the voicemail message, because it's new. Amy was there for the old one, laying across Karma's bed with a million pieces of plastic wrap her parents wouldn't approve of strewn across the bed. After weeks of complaining, guilting, and begging, the Ashcrofts had finally caved in and got their only daughter a smart phone. Karma's eyes where shining when she slid her thumb across the unlock screen, and Amy practically melted at the happiness in her voice when she recorded the message. It's gone now.

When all she gets is a busy signals she throws the phone across the room, hard. Isn't that the first thing to always go in those crazy movies? Technology. She wishes she liked the genre more, but all of the blood and guts made her queasy, and Karma always preferred rom-coms.

"I'm," Lauren starts off, her voice quiet. Amy looks over at her because it's the polite thing to do, not really listening. Her phone's in five parts on the floor and if Karma or her mother does call, she's fucked.

"I'm sure they're okay."

For some reason it actually does make her feel better, and while Amy doesn't prefer physical contact she gets the urge to slide her hands across the table and grab onto Lauren's hands for dear life. The urge tugs at her fiercely, and dissolves into more silence, just like everything else.

A couple of minutes later Karma's parents walk in, and Amy's looking for a weapon just in case they decide to leave the door open for their new friends. There are so many questions she wants to ask, like how can you manage to be so weird even in the zombie apocalypse and why were you dancing with flesh-eating monsters? But "where is Karma" is the first and only question out of her mouth and Mrs. Ashcroft looks confused.

"She was studying with you, Amy. Something about an anatomy paper?" 

Amy's blood turns to ice and not because, just like always, Karma found a way to get her way at everyone's expense. It's because it's the same excuse she would feed her family when she wanted time out of the house and away from their special brand of crazy. It's because she would spend hours cuddled into Amy's side as she made them watch West Side Story or Simple Life. The simple ache of missing Karma, of being left out in the cold, cuts too deep and all of the other wounds still aren't healed yet.

"Oh, right," she answers tight-lipped, because even after all of this time she's still got Karma under her skin, tucked right next to her heart. She has no idea where Liam Booker, or whoever Karma's hooking up with right now, lives and maybe it's time to do something for herself before there's no time left to.

"We have to go, be careful, okay?"

Amy's greeted by smiles and assurances, and if anyone is going to thrive in this new world, it'll be Mr. and Mrs. Ashcroft. She's sure of it.

~~

The radio tells them to head for the Fort Hood, but it feels like an impossible goal. Amy remembers the ride up to a park right past it, nearly an hour and a half away. With no way to get into a car, and the streets too flooded for anything bigger than a bicycle, they head back to the house to pack.

It smells like someone left meat out in their house, and in a way, it's true.

"Why don't you go upstairs and find us some bags and look through your stuff?"

It's a small mercy, and it takes Amy five minutes just to build up the courage to go back into the kitchen. The smell intensifies the closer she gets to the pantry, and Amy's choking onto her breath as she opens the fridge. She closes it. Idiot. Non-perishables, cans and other things that won't go rotten on their journey. 

"Amy!" Lauren calls out, and she's halfway up the stairs, running, before she realizes that Lauren sounds more annoyed than anything else. Her bedroom door is wide open and Amy walks in, surprised at the disheveled state. Lauren's room is always prim and proper, in a nauseating shade of pink that hurts Amy's eyes and stomach.

"What's wrong?"

Lauren's sitting on the floor, purses in a loose circle around her. She's halfway in her closet, and Amy's sure there are a million jokes she could make right now if she was wittier. The apocalypse really puts a drain on the humor department. 

"Are you seriously out of breath right now? This is what happens when you spend all of your time on the internet, googling lesbian porn and feminist propaganda." 

Amy ignores her, standing with her hands on her hips. After a moment, when Lauren realizes she isn't going to take the bait, she huffs obnoxiously and throws up her hands.

"All of my purses are too cute for the end of the world."

"I didn't tell you to get a purse, I said to get a bag."

"Purses are bags, Ellen. Not all of us have duffel bags laying around for our curling practice."

Their eyes meet for a couple of intense moments, and with an eye-roll that would make Karma proud, Amy turns around and heads into her room, back into her own closet. She has a couple of messenger bags, hidden on the top shelf from when they were a thing and Karma demanded they buy them. That faze washed over Hester High in about two weeks, and she was stuck with slightly uncomfortable bags that make her boobs look lopsided.

"Here," Amy says as she throws two of the bags to Lauren, who doesn't even attempt to catch it. She looks over the bag with a look on her face that's just waiting to start trouble, and Amy tilts her head, waiting for the impact.

"Save some room for food and necessities."

"And what exactly constitutes a necessity?"

"I dunno, like a hairbrush, socks, beef jerky?"

"Seriously?"

"We don't exactly have room for your five dozen beauty supplies and who knows how long it's going to take us to walk to Fort Hood. This isn't an episode of Wife Swap."

"I have to go how many weeks without makeup? Are you kidding me?"

"Yeah Lauren, I'm joking about the end of the world. Because it's so damn funny. Ha, ha. " 

Lauren's huffing and pacing, and it's the most alive she's looked in too long time and Amy just breathes it all in, soaking up how not dead they are in this moment. Her own heart is thrumming in her chest, her cheeks are flushed with anger and her fists are balled up so tight she can feel her short fingernails in the palm of her hands. The sarcasm is so heavy on her tongue it's almost weighing her down and then Lauren's in her personal space, breathing just as hard.

"Whatever," Amy breaks the silence, spinning on her heel to pack her own bags. She's sick of the silence and sick of the end of the world already. Being a teenager is hard enough before you add in flesh eating monsters. If Lauren doesn't want to pack like a reasonable human being, she'll be the stupid, malnourished blonde girl with an empty stomach and cold feet.

She's halfway to her room when Lauren calls out, her tone on par with a rabid bear.

"You better not pack that stupid donut shirt!" 

"Watch me."

~~

She doesn't just pack the donut shirt, she wears it under her favorite hoodie. Lauren's father had a handgun locked in a safe, and Amy's hands trembled as she flicked the numbers to match her parent's anniversary. Amy loads the magazine into the gun after figuring out where the safety is, and when it clicks into place she just stares at it for a couple of seconds before tucking it into her jacket pocket. There's an old baseball bat her mother used to carry in her car before they moved to Hester, and she grabs that, too.

They have enough food to last for two weeks, maybe, and water for three if they ration it right. Amy and Lauren leave through the back door, sliding the glass door shut with a small click. Lauren's huddled behind her, and Amy wonders where the big, scary bitch went. Sure, her and Lauren have improved their relationship, but that never stops Lauren from being able to cut her down with just a couple of sentences. 

Something moans, hungry, and Amy curses under her breath, heading straight for the wooden fence that cuts along their backyard. She turns, and Lauren finally just shuts up for once and accepts her boost. Amy struggles to follow her over the six foot tall fence, and they land in their neighbor's yard.

She's smart enough to make her plan before they left, and through her neighbor's lawn and up the nearest backstreet is the quickest way to get north. Lauren stays close, always right behind her right arm, and Amy keeps her eyes on the prize, trying not to think about what would happen if they fail.

A rotting hand swipes in front of Amy, and she nearly jumps out of her skin and drops her bat. The sagging face of Mrs. Chen, her once-neighbor, comes into view, clacking her teeth with that dead, blank look in her eyes. Amy's grasp tightens around the bat and she swings it, wildly in front of her, hoping to connect with something. She winds up smacking Mrs. Chen in the arm, which promptly falls off and thuds against the grass next to them.

Mrs. Chen's groan fills the yard, and Amy's mumbling "shit, shit, shit," over and over again, as she raises the bat over her head like it's a club. It comes down with a disgusting crack, and Mrs. Chen crumples to the ground, brain matter spilling out next to her arm. Amy looks back and forth, between the stained bat and the kind woman who tended to a large garden right next to her house, and promptly loses her breakfast into a healthy looking bush. It burns her throat and she's doubled over, heaving as the smell floods up her nose, rotting corpse and half-processed orange juice, and a tiny hand rubs circles in her back as she unloads whatever's left in her stomach.

Amy wipes her mouth with the sleeve of her jacket and refuses to meet Lauren's gaze. They have to make it to Fort Hood, or all of this killing and bloodshed will be for nothing.

They make it to the outskirts of town right as the sun is setting, and Amy finds a long abandoned building with a crumbling roof. She stops at the door, taking a look around Hester's borders before taking the final step. This is it, they're leaving, and probably never coming back. Amy shifts her backpack, feeling ever ounce of the small stack of pictures she lined the bottom of the knapsack with. A lifetime of memories, heartbreak, weddings and confusion, and now they mean nothing. They can't exist in this new world. Nothing happy does.

"I'm going to go make sure the house is clear, you stay here."

"Uh, no way! The pretty, popular blonde girl with no weapons always dies first, genius."

"Fine. Stay close." Amy doesn't have the energy to argue. She's seen too much today, too much death and blood and violence, and even though she'll never admit it, having Lauren with her is one of the only things keeping her hinged. She's all hyped up, with someone to protect and someone to keep her from being alone with her thoughts. Right now, Lauren is the most important person in her life. She doesn't dwell on that long.

The wooden door creaks over when Amy puts pressure on it, and she readies the bat. If there is something in the house, she doesn't want a gunshot to alert all of it's friends lurking around. Lauren closes the door behind them, and Amy steels herself, taking a deep breath before starting into the living room. They go room by room, at a painstakingly slow pace. The living room, dining room, and kitchen are all clear. Amy rummages through the cabinets, finding one or two boxes and a handful of assorted cans. Whoever left this house, left it long before the zombies popped up.

A floorboard creaks upstairs. Amy tenses, and Lauren lets out a tiny whimper behind her. Despite the water she just had five minutes ago, Amy's mouth is dry and her throat feels scratchy as she tries to swallow her fear down. She heads up the stairs, trying to avoid creaky planks, and waits at the top. Lauren is actually holding on to her hoodie, and if Amy wasn't so absolutely terrified she'd tell her to let go, because how is she supposed to be all heroic and swing a bat at a monster if she can barely move her torso.

They head left first, and all that's there is a dinosaur themed bathroom and the remnants of a child's room. The walls are brightly painted, and toys litter the play rug in the middle. There's one room left, at the end of the hallway with the door partially open. Amy pushes the door all of the way open with her bat, her heart loud in her ears as she waits for a reaction. Nothing stirs in the room. She raises the bat up to chest level, ready to swing, and crosses the threshold.

A black spot shifts, deep in the shadows, and bolts towards her. Amy doesn't have the reaction speed to swing and catch the blob, but she does let out a shriek of horror as it jumps at her chest, knocking her over. Lauren shriek's even louder, her voice on the border of hysterics and tears and she shoves the thing off of Amy's chest.

"You can't take her too, you bastard, you can't!"

Amy turns, reaching for the bat she dropped, when a small tongue darts out to... lick her hand? She freezes, in confusion, as the small mouth licks her wrist. As her eyes adjust to the dark room, Amy sees a smaller dog, pitch black fur with light brown eyes staring up at her.

"You have got to be kidding me." Amy sags in relief, turning to look at Lauren who has tears in her eyes. It cuts right through Amy's giddiness, her mood turning somber in an instant, and Amy pulls Lauren into her, ignoring the watery squawk of protest. 

The hug isn't really comforting or comfortable. Lauren's clutching on to her for dear life, and Amy realizing that Lauren needs her just as much as she needs Lauren, if not more. They stay there, clinging to each other, until Amy feels too warm and the handgun digs into her gut. Lauren looks up at her, something related to disdain in her eyes, and suddenly Amy is burning up, cheeks bright red as Lauren kisses her.

It's needy and desperate and she feels it from the tip of her toes up to where Lauren happens to be giving her the most passionate kiss of her life. It's selfish and greedy, but Amy needs it, craves it, can't let go just yet. Lauren's tongue enters her mouth and Amy's gripping the back of Lauren's head so hard that her fingers tangle into her hair. Her hoodie's unzipped - somehow, when did that happen? - and Lauren's fists clench around her "stupid donut shirt", holding Amy to her.

They're clinging onto each other like they're the last humans alive on Earth, and who the fuck knows, maybe they are? The thought just makes Amy more desperate. Lauren's mouth slips down, kissing Amy's neck and she gives in entirely, using Lauren just as roughly as Lauren's using her.

~~

"He's gross, and probably has like fifteen types of fleas and worms. And he needs food and water, Amy, and in case you haven't noticed, Costo isn't exactly running a special."

Amy decides to name the dog Scrappy, with Lauren rolls her eyes at. The dog's a mixed mutt, and Amy think he's half corgi while Lauren thinks he's half chow. Scrappy isn't a fighter, and he's more likely to be lunch than a hero, but he gets nervous and jittery when the zombies are nearby way before either one of them can hear them, so he's an important member of the team. Amy shares her rations with Scrappy, because that was the deal when Lauren finally caved in, and he sleeps on her side of the sleeping bag.

After about three weeks of travelling, they reach a small town that's been neglected by raiders. Lauren's pretty sure the town is Liberty Hill, according to the map, but the large welcome sign has been torn into pieces and they don't stick around main street long enough to find out. There's a hardware store, which is perfect for water and beef jerky, and not much else. There's a small bag of dog food that Amy makes room for in one of her bags, and when Lauren thinks she isn't looking, she stuffs a bag into her second backpack. They pick up new crowbars, since Amy's bat is worn and chipped and Lauren's just been clutching a hammer they found in a tool shed.

They don't talk about the clutching and groping and cumming that goes on. It happens more than once, and some days it goes further than others. Some days, Lauren pins Amy against the sleeping bag they're forced to share and fucks her until she can't remember her name. Other days, Amy's buried in between Lauren's thighs, tongue lazily moving against her in the damp, sticky not-quite-Fall-yet heat. It's a give and pull, and they're both addicted to the feel of another human that it's past the point of being awkward. Amy learns Lauren's body, mapping out the spots that make her toes curl and her voice catch in her throat. She becomes stupidly good at getting her off, and Amy's learned that when you want Lauren just to shut the fuck up, all it takes is two fingers. Lauren can't even pretend to insult her sex skills after weeks of travelling and sleeping together, and when she curls up under Amy's chin, arms loosely wrapped around her waist, it feels like how Amy always thought love would.

~~

It takes them two months, two weeks and six days to reach Fort Hood. They stick to the lesser highways and interstates, rerouting to keep as far away from I-35 as possible. They argue, heavily, the week before their arrival and the tension is something even sex can't cut through. Amy doesn't know how to feel about it, about moving into a large fort filled with people in close quarters. She doesn't know what's going to happen to with her and Lauren, and this strange state of more than friends but less than friends they're stuck in. It's like a bad episode of a 90's sitcom but there's flesh eating monsters knocking down the door and no time to resolve the plot.

A soldier nearly takes their heads off when the near the gates. Stacks of dead bodies, mutilated far before the gunshots tore up their skulls, lay outside of barbed wire fence. The soldier ushers them in, saying things like "we haven't seen anyone new in weeks" and "how did you little ladies survive out there?". Amy's overwhelmed by pretty much everything, and Lauren's devolved back into clinging to Amy's arm, holding on to the only think she's known for months. The soldier finally notices, and backs off.

They have large floodlights set up, and it's blinding as they walk through what used to be set up with metal detectors and armed security. A couple of soldiers, two men and one woman, are sitting in plastic lawn chairs around a table. Amy sees cards and cigarettes before the soldiers stand up suddenly, reaching for their rifles.

"Easy, fellas."

"Shit Rooker, I nearly blew your fuckin' head off."

The soldiers take their crowbars and hammers, and Amy begs to keep the handgun, the only thing she has from her family besides one or two crumpled, water-stained photos. They finally agree, after nearly fifteen minutes of pleading, but take the 9mm magazine and every single bullet she has on her person. The pistol goes to the bottom of her knapsack, and it's better than nothing. She refuses to move without Scrappy, who is patted down and searched for bites. Amy wants to ask if animals can even get infected, but these people are hard, all sharp angles and business, and she doesn't know how to respond.

Over the next couple of hours, they're bounced around from soldier to soldier. The first thing they do is strip them down to make sure there aren't any bite or scratch marks, and the commander in charge has the intelligence to send in a female soldier. The second is a field competency test. Amy's actually allowed to use her pistol, which she's only fired in combat four times, but her aim is pretty fair and she's all lean with hard muscle after months of survival. Even if she wasn't combat-ready, after months of protecting and killing, Amy isn't sure she'd be able to settle back into a classroom or kitchen. Lauren refuses to touch any of the weapons, and Amy stays by her side, always within five feet of touch even when she's going through push up and sit up sessions.

They're assigned bunks, work assignments, and given new identification papers and cards. Amy tries to argue when they split them up. Dorm assignments are based on work assignments, and Amy wants to go into combat while Lauren is shipped off to the educational departments. She didn't technically graduate high school, and the only time Lauren looks like the Lauren she knows is when she's chewing out a six-foot-something soldier who tries to tell her she'll be washing laundry for a living. She's reassigned to teaching, which is slightly terrifying, but she seems happy with the placement, so Amy doesn't comment. 

It's the softest bed she's laid on in over two months. She doesn't sleep the first two nights, grabbing for warmth that isn't there and twitching for her pistol every time she sleeps. Every sound in the dark is a possible walker, and even though Scrappy sleeps at the foot of her bed, she just can't feel safe under concrete walls. She wonders if Lauren can sleep, and why she hasn't come to see her even though she's left two messages with her roommates. Combat training is more of the same, with Amy learning her way around a rifle she'll never use and practicing her shot with her pistol. She learns how to properly clean it, and assemble and disassemble it, and although her muscles are sore and her back ache when she comes back to her bed at night, sleep evades her.

Sanders, her roommate, answers the door on the third night, and Amy can barely lift her head off the pillow to see who it is. Amy likes Sanders, whose first name is Suzanne. She has pretty eyes and a kindness under the rough and tough soldiering she does, and Sanders has helped Amy through some of the procedures she just doesn't understand. Lauren walks in and Sanders finishes polishing her boots, before noticing the tension and abruptly leaving.

"You've been avoiding me," Amy says flatly, and Lauren rolls her eyes. It makes her inescapably angry and Amy finds the energy to get to her feet, ready to yell.

"Fuck you Lauren, okay? If you want to be a bitch go do it in your own-" She's cut off with the harsh press of Lauren's soft kiss, and Amy returns the pressure just as hard. There's scratching and bruising and grabbing, and Amy's just so angry at Lauren for leaving her, for avoiding her, for making her need her without Amy ever noticing until it was too late. Amy winds up naked underneath Lauren, her aching muscles protesting too much, and within a few minutes she's cumming, hard, scratching at Lauren's bare back and sweating. She returns the favor, and Lauren screams her name and Amy's never heard anything quite as beautiful in such a strange, lonely place. They cover up with the thin sheets each bed comes standard with, and Lauren's tucked right under Amy's chin. She falls asleep within seconds.

When she wakes up, Lauren is buttoning up the standard issue blouse for all of the educators at the foot of Amy's bed. She scratches Scrappy under his ear, a soft, rare smile on her face. Amy sits up and the smile drops, Lauren turning to face her.

"I need to show you something," Lauren says, and Amy can't help but feel sick to her stomach.

~~

Apparently the dorms are listed, and new arrivals and their posts are pinned to a huge section of cork boards in the mess hall.

Karma hugs her and it feels off. She doesn't tuck under Amy's chin like she should, and she's too curvy against Amy's thinner, lanky frame. She's outgrown her, or maybe it's the opposite way around. All Amy knows is that she's reaching out for Lauren's hand before the hug is even finished, and that her chest burns when Lauren ignores it and looks off to the side, striking up a conversation with Liam, flirting with Liam. Karma's talking, and Amy desperately wants to cling on to her every word like she used to, but she just can't seem to soak herself in Karma.

"Hey, are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." Her smile doesn't reach her eyes, but Karma doesn't seem to notice. Lauren and Liam leave together and the anger thickens and spreads from her chest to her entire body and she winds up cutting Karma off mid-sentence.

"Are you and Liam not a thing, or what?"

Karma's smile fades, and Amy remembers when her world used to revolve around keeping it on Karma's face. The end of the world has a way of fucking everything up.

"You're different," Karma says, and it sounds like an accusation.

"Surviving on your own in a zombie apocalypse tends to change people," Amy snaps back, because Karma left her in Hester while she and Liam rode off on some Army truck together and never looked back.

"You weren't alone," is the soft reply, and hot tears sting Amy's eyes. 

"I might as well have been." She leaves because it hurts too much to stay.

~~

Her dorm room door opens.

"I didn't sleep with him."

"I don't care."

Amy doesn't bother to turn around. She's ironing her new uniform, standing around her dorm room in a pair of boxers. "Raudenfeld" is freshly stitched, and Amy wonders if her mother would be proud of where she wound up. She can never decide, and it tears her up inside.

"You obviously do, because you wouldn't even sit with me at lunch, and you've changed your showering schedule just so you don't have to see me."

Life at the base is a lot like life before Z-day, as her troop calls it. They have food, showers, jobs and even private tutors. Amy heard that someone was trying to set up football teams too, for friendly scrimmages. But there are armed soldiers everywhere, and scattered shooting that echos through the long corridors at all hours of the day.

"I know it's hard for you to get through your thick, egotistical head, but I do have people in my life besides you, Lauren."

She sleeps like shit, and that's only when she can fall asleep. They've been at the fort for two weeks, and she's slept maybe three nights. There are bags under her eyes, and while she's putting on weight from training and eating properly, she looks strained. Lauren can read her like a book.

"Are you seriously going to make me say it?"

Amy brazenly ignores her, focusing on her ironing, and Lauren lets out a long, obnoxious, drawn-out sigh. She sets her hand on her hip, body language the epitome of attitude, but her voice is small and scared.

"Amy, I need you, okay?"

Amy pauses. Throughout everything, all they've been through, Lauren's never actually admitted anything other than begrudging respect for her. She turns the iron off - power is expensive and important, after all - and meets her eyes.

"And what happens when you don't need me any more?"

Lauren takes a step towards her, and Amy isn't sure if she's going to kiss her or slap her.

"You're not listening."

"Yes, I am," Amy responses, her tone petulant. This time, she deserves the eye roll she gets in response.

"I need you, and not just for the amazing sex or sleep, but because I can't figure out how to live my stupid, pathetic life without you." 

Lauren throws up her hands in pure exasperation, and Amy's strong, calloused hands are on her face as she leans in for a deep, intense kiss. It isn't a promise or a moment of clarity, or anything else that happens in all of those books Farrah used to read. It's simple, real and human, and it's all Amy could ask for.

"I love you too, Lauren."

"Shut up Raudenfeld."


End file.
